"... net neutrality provisions it agreed to in its purchase of NBCUniversal in 2011 will be automatically extended to Time Warner. Those conditions, which expire in 2018, prevent Comcast from blocking or discriminating against Internet services like Netflix or YouTube."

Yes, actively blocking or discriminating against. That statement (and other similar ones in other articles) doesn't address the possibility of "letting non-optimized traffic patterns continue to degrade over the life of the agreement, until the service is near-unusable anyway" which is likely the cause of current Netflix speed issues.

Verizon and Comcast might say they're not actively throttling traffic, but the case can certainly be made that they're not making much attempt at allowing it to work as advertised, either.

Been said a number of times, but the ONLY way this makes sense for consumers is if:

1) Comcast sells off or spins off its content interests (including NBC and its speciality stations and Universal Studios), and any other content-generator companies that have been under their mega-umbrella in recent years. Their business should solely be providing access to the internet, access to television and access to phone service, without having any control whatever over content.

2) The FCC has to make it EASY for small, local cable companies to get into the game, and have full access the cable infrastructure, in 100% of markets. Some apologists talk about "Comcast can't force companies out of a market" but the reality is they've gamed the system so that it's cost-prohibitive for new start-ups to gain access to cable infrastructure in many places.

3) All arrangements between Verizon and Comcast to stay out of each other's broadband markets, must be ruled collusive / illegal, bringing FiOS to all markets where Comcast operates.

Then and only then would this merger be anything but a giant compost heap.

The author of that shillage couldn't even be bothered to make a half-assed argument in favor of this travesty. Whatever Comcast paid for that propaganda, they were ripped off. A Comcast marketing intern could have farted that out at lunch time.

Sure, the US could block this, but given the way that the corps totally own Washinton they won't. This merger will screw over the public, but the corps are the politician's real constituents, not the public. The days of Teddy Roosevelt style trust busting has been over for decades now.

The provision I know would never fly, but I would love to see: All cables are, after 10 years, required to be available for leasing to third parties at fair market rates.

In other words, to open up the cable system like DSL on phone lines, where competitors can come in and start their own ISPs and cable TV providers on the same lines. You know, so we could have real actual competition for a change.

Unfortunately, beyond the fact that the FCC's corporate masters would never agree to this, I think there are technical reasons why it would not fly as well--cable lines are shared too much between households.

Been said a number of times, but the ONLY way this makes sense for consumers is if:

1) Comcast sells off or spins off its content interests (including NBC and its speciality stations and Universal Studios), and any other content-generator companies that have been under their mega-umbrella in recent years. Their business should solely be providing access to the internet, access to television and access to phone service, without having any control whatever over content.

This point is so important... With as much reach as they will have, they can not have any hands in the content cookie jar...

2) The FCC has to make it EASY for small, local cable companies to get into the game, and have full access the cable infrastructure, in 100% of markets. Some apologists talk about "Comcast can't force companies out of a market" but the reality is they've gamed the system so that it's cost-prohibitive for new start-ups to gain access to cable infrastructure in many places.

If Comcast were forced to let other providers use its infrastructure at fair prices (like BT Britain), then the deal might actually be good for consumers. Unfortunately, there is no way in hell they would agree to it because it would increase competition. It would mean giving up their monopoly/duopoly status in so many places.

Unfortunately I can't say that I'm surprised it turned out this way. To most people computers and technology are pure magic. They don't understand peering agreements, they don't really know there's a night and day difference between DSL and cable/fiber services (and that the two are not even close to being considered competition), and most of them don't stream Netflix or Youtube enough (or at all) to notice quality and buffering problems. Or if they do, again, it's magic to them. Buffering issues could be caused by a sun spot, someone slaying a jabberwock with a vorpal blade, computer virus, etc.

I'm sincerely hoping our technical literacy gets to the point that people understand what a big deal it is that there's usually only one broadband provider you can buy service from, and how severely a company in that situation can abuse their power. I'm still kind of shocked that we realized what bad news it would be to allow utilities to operate unregulated, but somehow the identical (nay, perhaps even more pure because of the cost of moving bits) natural monopoly of ISPs and infrastructure has slipped under the radar.

The notion that a merger like this can have a significant chance of being approved boggles my mind. How in any way can this be good for consumers in a market that is already an oligarchy?

One of the core argument in support of the merger, that since Comcast and Time-Warner don't compete in any of the same markets, is completely ludicrous. Comcast physically can't compete in those markets because it doesn't have any infrastructure there.

Also, can someone please explain the quip found on:[link]http://www.twcmedia.com/TWC/PB/CustomerCoveragePage.aspx[/link]

"No one covers America like Time Warner Cable. As of November 2010, 41% of TV households across the country are Time Warner Cable subscribers."

As much as I'd love to see the FCC stand up to this, the fact they already let a content delivery service purchase a content producer shows they have zero interest in protecting the American consumer.

It should be even more blatantly obvious with yesterday's news that Time Warner is apparently backing away from adding Netflix to its DVRs thanks to Comcast. Of course, money always talks louder than the interest of the customer, even when all the evidence shows this could be nothing but damaging to an already-messed-up marketplace. The best-case scenario for this merger is that everything stays just as shitty as it already is.

Yea, this is a downvote. OK, here is the skinny, they don't have to compete directly against each other at this moment to harm the consumer. Much like AT&T and Clear Channel they just need to get big enough in the future to do harm. Swallowing up a large company to become an even larger company provides leverage in current markets due to a wider base to spread losses and risk. They squash one market at a time and once smaller competition has been driven out, well, it is expensive to maintain ancient hardware and those bits aren't going to push themselves out of those pipe thingies!

Fewer companies always always ALWAYS equals less competition. Just because they don't compete now does not preclude their competing in the future.

The answer to all of this is not to beseech Washington to save us from corporate autocracy, but publicly owned and operated last mile infrastructure. Keep it local where we have some hope of influencing the politics directly and democratically.

Been said a number of times, but the ONLY way this makes sense for consumers is if:

1) Comcast sells off or spins off its content interests (including NBC and its speciality stations and Universal Studios), and any other content-generator companies that have been under their mega-umbrella in recent years. Their business should solely be providing access to the internet, access to television and access to phone service, without having any control whatever over content.

2) The FCC has to make it EASY for small, local cable companies to get into the game, and have full access the cable infrastructure, in 100% of markets. Some apologists talk about "Comcast can't force companies out of a market" but the reality is they've gamed the system so that it's cost-prohibitive for new start-ups to gain access to cable infrastructure in many places.

3) All arrangements between Verizon and Comcast to stay out of each other's broadband markets, must be ruled collusive / illegal, bringing FiOS to all markets where Comcast operates.

Then and only then would this merger be anything but a giant compost heap.

I disagree. Much like the AT&T/T-Mobile and Sprint/T-Mobile mergers this merger will never be anything but a gian compost heap overflowing with political goodness and f(l)avor.

Nothing good will come from such a merger, the customers lose. With that being said, the powers that be will not stop it, the corporations run America now. No such thing as Capitalism or the like, just Corporatism.

They also said that the FCC is an independent agency. Unfortunately, they left it up to the reader's imagination to infer what that means. I wish they had just come out and said it: BECAUSE the FCC is an independent agency, Obama CANNOT simply direct them to implement net neutrality (or any other executive order).

A monopolistic player merging with another monopolistic player is still a monopolistic player.

I sincerely hope this merger isn't allowed to actually take place. Consumer choices for broadband are usually pretty slim in most areas, and it certainly doesn't encourage competition that benefits the customer when one big fish swallows another.

When this deal was announced, my initial reaction was that there was no way that the DOJ would allow this to happen. But as this article points out:"They would have to show that there is a substantial likelihood that the transaction would reduce competition in some relevant market." Due to the monopolistic nature of cable TV, I'm not sure that they do compete in any areas (and if they do, it can't be many). Still hoping it gets blocked some how. I'm somewhat satifisfied with my TWC service and hated Comcast where I lived before.

The FCC should force Comcast to sell access to their infrastructure to third-party companies so that they can compete in tv/internet/phone (while paying comcast reasonable rates). Kinda how everyone is allowed to use phones lines to provide service... just extend that to the cable network.

When this deal was announced, my initial reaction was that there was no way that the DOJ would allow this to happen. But as this article points out:"They would have to show that there is a substantial likelihood that the transaction would reduce competition in some relevant market."

There has been some discussion that content creators could show the post-merger Comcast could exercise monopsony power in the market for purchasing TV content. But think about that: if Comcast were big enough to exert leverage over the likes of CBS to extract lower carriage fees, how exactly would that be a bad thing for consumers / viewers?

1) Force all physical cable plants to be declared a common carrier.2) Split all content aggregators (like Comcast, TWC, and the others) and content providers (like Comcast/NBC Universal) to divest themselves of all last-mile networks. These cannot be wholly own subsidiaries, but must be totally separate entities.

What this does is threefold: First, it ensures that some content providers cannot lock out or degrade other content providers on their networks (ie, Comcast not allowing Netflix or slowing them to the point of SD quality only). Second, it opens up competition between cable companies by allowing all comers to offer service over the physical cable plant (via IP streaming, like TWC and Comcast do now via their iPad apps). Third, it allows the cable plant operators to compete on service and price for their core competency - bandwidth.

Now, the cable companies will fight this tooth and nail. They're addicted to the large revenue stream that a captive consumer base brings. And this directly affects this in a big negative way, and forces them to start competing on quality, service, and price - something they are not equipped to do.

Comcast spent $18.8 million on lobbying in 2013. They were the seventh biggest lobbyist in Washington, spending more than the likes of GE, AT&T, or Boeing. TWC spent $3.6 million. Together, Comcast and TWC would have been the fourth biggest lobbyist in Washington, behind only the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Realtors, and Blue Cross Blue Shield. The power they would have to dictate law (and fight further restrictions on lobbying) would only increase with time.

Comcast spent $18.8 million on lobbying in 2013. They were the seventh biggest lobbyist in Washington, spending more than the likes of GE, AT&T, or Boeing. TWC spent $3.6 million. Together, Comcast and TWC would have been the fourth biggest lobbyist in Washington, behind only the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Realtors, and Blue Cross Blue Shield. The power they would have to dictate law (and fight further restrictions on lobbying) would only increase with time.